HAKUBA TRAVEL GUIDE ⛷️🚡 | Things to Do in Hakuba, Japan

Hello and greetings from Hakuba, a small town and world-famous ski resort set in the northern Japanese Alps! This was the final stop of our trip across Japan and we decided to end things off in a quiet destination. In this video, we’ll ride various gondolas and chair lifts as we go in search of mountain views, we’ll encounter some of the local residents – the snow monkeys – who roam around town, and we’ll show you how athletes train for the Olympics at the local ski jump! If you’ve been following our Japan series, thank you for watching, and now let’s go on one final adventure in Hakuba.

HAKUBA TRAVEL GUIDE | Things to Do in Hakuba, Japan
00:49 – Happo-one Gondola Station
05:29 – Hakuba Glad Inn Ebisuya
06:53 – Hakuba Bridge
09:28 – Iwatake Gondola Lift
11:52 – City Bakery
17:17 – Hakuba Foot Bath
18:54 – Hakuba Ski Jumping Stadium
23″41 – Shimofurimiya Hosonosuwa Shrine

#hakuba #hakubajapan #hakubavalley

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Hello and greetings from hakuba a small town and world famous ski resort set in the northern Japanese Alps this was the final stop of a trip across Japan and we decided to end things off in a quiet destination just the best feeling in the world in this video we’ll ride various

Gondolas and chair lifts as we go in search of mountain views all for the views all to show you guys the views I think we’re going to get the most amazing ones from up there we’ll encounter some of the local residents the snow monkeys who roam freely around

Town two snow monkeys in town acting like their own place and we’ll show you how athletes train for the Olympics at the local ski if you’ve been following our Japan series thank you so much for watching and now let’s go on one final Adventure

Here we go ready to go up it’s going to shoot us up any second now shoot it up to the stars and Beyond little rough we’re in a really small small thing so we are riding the haa one Gondola up I’ve heard this is a bit of a bumpy rickety Gondola so I’m

Just trying not to think about it too much but oh you read about that you didn’t tell me that’s funny we kicked off our first afternoon in hakuba by riding a gondola up a Mountaintop this is a town of ski resorts and during the warmer months that means Gondola rides

To enjoy the Epic views initially our plan had been to hike to the hoo Pond a small Alpine Lake however when we went to buy our Gondola tickets we learned it was too late in the day to complete that hike however we decided to ride the next two chairlifts anyway since we were

Already there now you know if you want to hike and make it to the pond or Beyond you need to get an early start so we upgraded our tickets friends I feel less defeated less defeated how about you we’re taking the two ski lifts up we

Still won’t be able to hike but I mean at least we can enjoy the ride up and the views we’re going for those epic snow cap Mountain views we feel like we got so close to seeing them but like we just need a little bit of a higher

Vantage point so we’re like oh we don’t want to be defeated that’s my that’s my only thoughts going up so thoughts thoughts totally worth it totally worth it we have those epic Mountain views we wanted to see and we get to do a little bit of hiking and go

Up one more yeah I I’m so glad we did it I was honestly feeling defeated and a little grumpy and now uh I’ve got pep back in my step and a smile on my face okay all is well all is SW all is SW and look here we’ve got one of the buildings

From the 1998 this particular one this one looks abandoned and there appears to be like a rusted chair left that appears defunked but I’m not entirely sure to our surprise what we thought was an abandoned chair lift is actually operational which is shocking giving the state of this Structure we’ve got our Canadian uniform the flannel damaged Boardwalk watch your Step we go to vle no next ski lift next another th000 Yen yeah we just love uh you know we love making the wallet a little lighter that’s s that’s what we’ve been up to today yeah so the tip just buy the the full pass at the entrance 3,300 Yen

Because it’s ended up being 4,000 yeah 300 y 100 yen each so yeah we bungled that up but you know what you know what who cares all for the views all to show you guys the views I think we’re going to get the most amazing ones from up

There mhm I’ll also mention the this ski lift chair lift whatever you want to call it it’s not as scary as I thought it would be because you’re only a meter and a half off the ground so there’s certain areas where the grass is really tall and you can actually touch it with

Your feet yeah so yeah I’d say the first part the All righty little room tour happening here before it gets too too messy voila yeah we just got back from hle yes we have and the nice thing is that our beds were premade yes so we have a realon style we have a nice little place to do

Some work or to have tea they left origami for us M and I think even some little treats yeah we we just had dinner so we haven’t even touched this but yeah it’s very cute little origami uh souvenir I suppose and here we’ve got our little tea set oh green

Tea if we decide to have some matcha some sweet treats so we’ll probably do that tomorrow and I’ll mention we ended up going out for dinner to a place called blizzard it’s a pizzeria run by some Australians and it was so so good we got their pepperoni pizza baked in a stone

Oven and then we had a Caesar salad and then we decided to get a dessert pizza we just couldn’t help ourselves so we had the Nutella Pizza a yes and now all I want to do is relax maybe some maybe some onson time that too that’s part of the relaxation program for Sure Well good morning good morning good morning friends day two in hakuba and here we are hiking in the forest today we’re taking you up to E ucky where we’re planning to do another gondola ride for more epic Mountain views hey we’ve got to take advantage of these

Gorgeous fall colors here in Japan this is just eye candy and friends can I tell you something we woke up and it was cold this morning like single digit weather and already a couple hours later what time is it right now it’s just past 10: it’s warmed up considerably yeah now

What’s interesting today is that it’s scheduled to rain in the afternoon so we are trying to squeeze everything in this morning before that happens yep well guys we made it out of the forest Out of the Woods I will say there there’s no signage in there so we were kind of just

Following the trails we knew the direction we needed to go in um we had our map which kind of shows the the GPS of where what direction we’re walking in so that helped but to rust your instincts yeah that would be my advice unless you have really bad internal GPS

Then don’t do it don’t press your instance but one thing that I’ll say though is there was the temptation to go up what look like a bike path avoid that one and it’s pretty obvious it’s a smoother more Narrow Path where you don’t see any stumps or anything like

That and it’s a little bit steeper yeah there’s mountain biking trails so you have to be careful which Trail you choose right but yeah I will say that’s one thing about hakuba is that I it’s I feel like it’s the one location where we would have benefited from having a

Vehicle to get around even though we don’t like renting cars just because the town is quite spread out ande the bus is very sporadic like it only passes by every few hours so you have to move around on foot or you need a vehicle or you really need to plan your day well

Could have been a vehicle even an ebike a scooter a motorbike I would take anything that could zip you around town yeah but we’re here we’re happy and we’re ready to go up a mountain yes we’ve made it to the gondola so the gondola we’re in we’re next another day another

Gondola hey you got to enjoy the gondola life here woo looks like this one’s going to be another rickety old one Glory wow you know what I have no idea what this is called but it’s definitely not a Smooth Operator Let Me Tell You ke we

Are going now but that was like kind of like being shoved you know off the track yeah you need momentum to make it up momentum take it up this old rickety thing I don’t feel like we’re going that far up today though like yesterday I

Think it’s an 8 minute ride the one that we did at hle I have no idea how long this one is but we’ll see we’re up in the air now with clamy hands and all so we made it to the top another rickety gondola ride so if that makes you

Nervous you’ve been warned and it actually looks like there’s quite a bit to do here like we’re seeing ATV rides there’s mountain biking horseback riding uh lots of different places where you can eat you know little cafes ice cream breweries there’s a yooo swing the yooo

Swing is very famous you have to buy a ticket yeah to to swing on the swing think go capture some other people in I don’t know if I need to do it but it looks fun you’re swinging towards the mountain yes you are look at that guys the clouds are

Starting to roll in and cover up those snowy mountain peaks but that’s Mountain weather for You A cafe with a view yes what’s a view shall we check it Out okay so we came into the cafe with the view it’s called City Bakery and we got their on the mountain top on the mountain top City Bakery on the Mountaintop this is their specialty it’s called The Baker’s muffin but the pastry looks more like a croissant smells like apple cinnamon I

Smell the cinnamon from here I think I also read it has walnuts W so attack yeah we thought we would get a little snack and that way we can also enjoy the views look at that you can just break off little pieces like petals it’s almost like a cinnamon bun mhm slash

Muffin mhm slash pastry good muffin shaped but not muffin texture okay it’s tasty yeahum well that’ll for smell the SM fory us as we walk around up here we’re going to do lunch afterwards this is just just a little something you know how we roll we snack nice little seating

Area out here guys this is the place to be if you want the Tranquility still got the mountain views it’s way busy on the other side of the cafe where everyone is vying for that picture perfect shot oh yeah we just watched a 15minute photo shoot yeah and then the person was like

One more minute everyone’s trying to no no one more minute it was uh kind of Shameless to be honest but I had to admire the confidence feeling adventurous yes they’ve got like little can I call this a monkey gym yeah to to work on your your balance I know there’s

People who can just like walk on these slacks are they called yeah and like it’s like the tight rope on their own let’s call it the tight rope I need the assistance how’s the balance feel I can feel it in my core you feel it in your

Core that’s funny autumn colors out in full force yeah there’s a couple nice little trails that you can go on here they don’t appear to be very big but you avoid the crowds and you get to see the Fall colors a little bit more up close and intimately We decided to grab lunch at the bottom of the ski lift this little place is called rocks and it’s part of the iwatake mountain resort they had pulled pork hamburgers on the menu so that’s what we ordered Pulled pork friends pulled pork burger nice and Sloppy there’s a snow Monkey oh wow look I’m getting it oh yeah look at that Audrey yum yum oh that’s amazing no good morning day three here in hakuba we’ve woken up to a cool day today the max is going to be 9° so we’re all bundled up yeah and let’s call this day the monkey SE monkey do Edition oh my

Gosh yes the first thing we were greeted to are two snow monkeys in town yeah acting like they own the place one jumped up into a tree and was H foraging for berries and the other one jumped up onto a a signboard we didn’t film that

Part but it freaked out this lady who was walking her dog and then it just walked across the street and went into the uh field it’s crazy I was not expecting to see the monkeys here like I mean we are still a Nago prefecture I

Know the monkeys live up here in the in the Japanese Alps but I just wasn’t expecting them wandering through town so I will say because we’re here off seon there are very few people in town like the streets are empty so I can see why the monkeys would be roaming like

They own the place yeah we may actually be the only people staying in our four level guest house at the moment which is a great place to stay we’ve had a fantastic breakfast there we should talk a bit about that how good was that so the place is called Hotel glad in

Ebisuya and yeah we signed up for breakfast today you have to do a day in advance it’s 1,000 yen per person and it was a feast there was so much food on the table yeah it was a real realon Delight in the sense that we’ve had that

Type of breakfast before in some really fancy places we’ve stayed at over the years here in Japan and um it was a combination of of Japanese traditional food and some Western food items too yes had the fish I had the rice had the Misa soup but also had yogurt it had some

Grapes had the zukie beans eggs and ham eggs and ham so like oh that was a brunch so we don’t need to be eating lunch I think today we’re going to be that will fortify us as we walk around town maybe do a little hike today visit

The food on sense so there’s some neat little things to do in the town that we’ve kind of lost for uh that we’ve kind of left for the end of our Trip Got friends that’s just the best just the best feeling in the world right now the temperature dropped to single digits we have a high of 8° today and so when we arrived here it was 21° 2 days ago so this feels at least three to five times

As good on a chilly day I can only imagine how nice this would be as a temp temperatures hover around 0° all righty just got out of the Little Foot Spa putting down rolling down my pants um yeah and if you guys if you’re staying in an accommodations here that doesn’t have an onen there’s a fantastic one just across from here I believe it’s 8,000 per per adult yeah I’m just going

To spin you around so literally that building there it’s a bath a public bath it would have all the facilities you’d ever want so even if you’re staying in accommodations that don’t have a nonent there’s plenty of ones you can go to for the day so next up we are going to the

Ski jump we can see it off in the distance over there precisely where those dark clouds are rolling in got sunlight here but we might be heading straight into the rain or even snow who knows there was something like we felt something in between snow and

Rain it almost like a slush coming down so we might be heading into that the W next we visited the hakua ski jumping Stadium where we got to see the ski Jumpers in action here’s a little sneak peek at how they train outside the winter Season [Applause] jeez I don’t know how we got so lucky first in Nagano when we went to the stadium and we got to watch the Speed skating and now here in hakuba with the jumps like this is so cool Incredible this was completely by accident we had

No clue this was happening and the thing is too that’s kind of funny is we’re of course both Canadian and these sports are also popular in Canada but we’ve never seen them before so we’re enjoying winter sports activities Olympic winter sports activities for the first time

Here in Nagano Japan which you be the prefecture to train if you’re were going to be the next Japanese Olympic Athlete impressive the athleticism guys I could not do that those Heights and then like flying through the air oh Wa After watching the future Olympic athletes and training we rode the chairlift and then the elevator to the top of the 90 M and 120 M jumps Going so we took the chair lift up now we’re taking the elevator to the observation tower and I think we’re going to get ourselves some nice views here let’s go oo this is really cool Ski Jumping Stadium [Applause] hakoba if you don’t mind Heights you can go up I do mind I do in fact mind I may go up I don’t think I think the skiers are done for today it looks like it’s going to be raining there’s also a small Museum inside the tower which is worth

Checking out if you’re already in the Area And now down the ski lift we go that was really cool really worth it cheapest ski lift our whole stay in hakuba for sure 4 yeah yeah return so normally we’re talking like 10 or more and uh I’m a nice silhouette here you can barely see

My face but I’m enjoying it sunny but raining and we are visiting a shrine so we’re in the middle of the town but we’re also right in the forest which is the coolest part and I wouldn’t be surprised if like a monkey ran across after all the monkeys we’ve seen today

He hey for all we know this could be called the snow monkey temple at least that’s what we’re unofficially calling it just a random site we spotted and we’re like let’s go check it out it’s beautiful here you got the shade of the trees look at that giant tree right

Beside it I mean absolutely incredible hidden gems throughout the Town This has been such a nice surprise guys this place is like a block away from our hotel I don’t know how many times we’ve walked past it while we’ve been here and I mean we could have completely missed this place if we didn’t decide to come and have a little peek after eating

Lunch like yeah this is a town that is full of surprises like I just said it’s it’s there’s there’s little things you really have to be paying attention M kind of get stuck in your head after having a meal and you’re wandering back you you wouldn’t notice this spot yeah

It’s so nice and it appears there’s a little Trail here we can go explore in the woods so let’s go check it out lead the Way it’s really good green tea well friends here we are we have come to the end of our travels in hakuba and the end of our trip across Japan as well my goodness did those six weeks ever go fast huh oh they did they did but they were sure action-packed so so G

By to that having some green tea and a Mochi a mugart Mochi filled with red bean paste that’s how we’re ending our time here yeah this is this is as good as it gets guys guys love being in the outfits love sitting down at the traditional seating table yes love

Having tea love having Mochi yeah we have become big fans of wearing the Yukata and going down to the Onsen having our hot bath soaking I mean I’m we’re going to have to go back to bubble baths and rubber ducky after this that’s not so cool huh I mean we love the Onan

Culture um actually I can honestly say that someday if we have a dream house I would love to have a a soundless slash onon combination okay something where I can go and and soak and then go have AA and do the polar plch and reverse and do

It all over again he’s dreaming big over I’m thinking big guys I don’t I I just need a man cave and a sauna I’m good I’m good in life yeah but I thought we could do some final thoughts on hakuba this place really surprised us like we knew

Next to nothing about it it was actually a recommendation turned out to be amazing we didn’t realize that it’s kind of like one of the the core destinations for Olympic sports and like getting to see the ski slide and like being there when the athletes were training and just

Watching them soore through the sky it was unbelievable yeah what talent and bravery yeah bravery too let’s be honest yeah just a great place and also kind of a nice place if you’ve had a bit of a a hectic schedule like we have we’ve been racing around for these past six weeks a

Nice way to slow it down before you head off to Tokyo one of the more interesting things is that we have a direct bus tomorrow to cash it’s only 5 hours we leave at 7:00 in the morning arrive at noon and uh that’s how we’re finishing

Off we’ll be flying from from there you know another assumption we had was that the Japanese Alps were just so far away from Tokyo and that maybe we could only get here on the shinkansen but they have bus routes like you can hop on a bus less than 5 hours you’re right and

Shinjuku so it’s super accessible and then you get here and you’re just surrounded by nature and you feel so far away from at all yeah that’s some that’s a tip to keep in mind we found that from our last trip too sometimes the buses would be less than half the price of the

Trains whether it be a regular train on the Jr line or or the shin kenzen considerably less but also slower and you know the taking the train is amazing so I’m not we’re not saying like take the bus over the train but if you’re on a bit more of a budg consider both

Options and see what works best for you yeah and one more tip with the buses something we learned today when we went to book our tickets there are different prices depending on whether you’re traveling midweek or weekend and the buses that leave later in the day are

Actually more expensive yeah and on the weekend too yeah so yeah there’s variable pricing apparently if you book online you can save a little bit as well yes so that’s something to think about we didn’t have time we left we’ve been winging all trip so especially with transportation we we often arrived day

Of this is actually one of the first tickets we bought one day in advance so but um if you’re not winging it um you could maybe save a little money online but anyways yeah we really liked it here we found the more we stayed here it kind

Of grew on us and there’s a lot of amazing Vantage points you can have we had three different ones by taking the cable cards yeah exactly we were saying one of the themes for hakua is just cars gondolas ski lifts whatever you want to call it you’re probably going to be

Riding one of those at least once per day because it’s how you get around yeah a couple other observations we notice more International Food than Japanese Cuisine in this town if you’ve been kind of like if you’ve been eating uh lots of soba and ramen and Sushi and so on and

You’re near the end of your trip and you’re like I wouldn’t mind a good pizza great pizza here they also had German food which we didn’t try Tex Mex Mexican food but it was like we were noticing more uh International Cuisine than than Japanese here which is I think the only

Place we can say that on this trip yeah where there was more International Food but um yeah overall we loved it and we hope you guys enjoyed this series Japan is a special place for us one of our favorite destinations in the world and we’d love to come back again right of

Course of course so that’s all for now t T [Applause] N